breath ~ speak ~ breath

Dianne Barker

I once saw a photo of a group of huge, obese African women who looked for all the world like they feasted on the finest food every day.

But the caption explained they were close to malnutrition because in their famine stricken country, the men ate the meat, the women were given the fatty off-cuts.

In our culture there is no discrimination. Men and women are stuffing fat down their throats with joy, revel and applause while obesity, heart conditions and sedentary lifestyles are at all time highs.

In an almost demonic twist, this is occurring at the same time that our televisions, magazines and movies are continually feeding our minds on images of the thin, the athletic, the super fit.

Reactions to this double-chinned dilemma range from those who intellectually dismiss any concern about body shape and size on the premise that, afterall, the real you is on the inside; to people who become fitness addicts obsessed with kilograms, calories and strange things called abs, buns and pecs?!

But let’s face it, the huge middle ground of opinion goes something like, “I don’t need to be an Elle McPherson or Brad Pitt, but I could lose a few (okay, several…) pounds

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